Mobile phone graveyard could be the source of a different ring

It's Australia's mobile phone graveyard. Close to 100 tonnes of discarded handsets, piling up at a rate of 15,000 per month at a site in Melbourne's suburban north.

Some have been there since 1999, but they're not dead yet.

These phones are waiting to be recycled, transformed into all manner of things including, literally, the kitchen sink, perhaps even wedding rings, which can be made from the gold content of about 350 phones.

Waste management specialist MRI Pty Ltd, which also recycles computers and televisions, anticipates it will have its handset recycling factory up and running in a couple of years.

But despite the business' Melbourne base, the company's CEO, Will Le Messurier, expects the recycling plant will be built in Sydney with expressions of interest likely to be taken within months.");document.write("

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"The IT industry tends to be centred in New South Wales ... there's probably more preparedness by the NSW Government to assist," he said.

Mr Le Messurier said the operation needed commitment from industry, government and the public - a recurring concern for those involved in the recycling business who say legislation needs to be improved and people more informed for recycling to realise its potential.

At the mobile phone recycling plant, handset parts will be sorted, and plastics reused. Valuable circuit boards that contain gold and other precious metals will be removed and recycled.

Already batteries are recycled, with some exported to France and made into new batteries, casings and an energy source in the smelting process.

Other metals recovered from batteries are used in road construction and stainless steel. "That can come back in any form from the kitchen sink through to a saucepan," said Mr Le Messurier.

He said it was important batteries were recycled because, even in small amounts, their contents could contaminate ground water if dumped in landfills.

Mobile phones were a small but valuable part of the recycling revolution, in its infancy and with endless potential, but it needed the cooperation of industry, government and the public to work, he said.

Having trouble is the Australian Vinyls Corporation, which last week warned only one in 15 PVC bottles put out for recycling actually were recycled. This reduced the recycling rate of PVC bottles from 5 per cent in 1999 to just 2 per cent today.

PVC plastic, which can be moulded but can't keep drinks carbonated, makes up just a small part of the market, which is dominated by PET plastic, used for soft drink bottles. The two must be sorted before recycling because they corrupt each other if mixed.

Rob Faulkner, of the Australian Vinyls Corporation, said PVC bottles were identified for recycling when used products were sorted by hand, but slipped through the system with automated sorting and were not being recycled.

But a spokesman for VISY Recycling, which handles around 60 per cent of recycling in metropolitan Melbourne, said most PVC it sorted did not end up in landfill, rather, with mixed plastics for general recycling.

VISY Recycling chairman Raphael Geminder said he was personally opposed to using PVC in drink bottles but had negotiated with the Australian Vinyls Corporation to help sort PVC for them from the waste stream.

"In the end they decided that wasn't the path they chose to go down," he said. "If they want their product and they want it aggressively, they've got to be prepared to pay for it."

Mr Faulkner said the Australian Vinyls Corporation had increased prices offered for sorted bottles by 25 to 50 per cent but still wasn't getting enough bottles.

"If there's a market, we should be doing everything to ensure it's fulfilled," he said.

For other plastics, VISY can't get enough.

Its Reservoir plastics recycling plant last year became the first in the world to be granted US Food and Drug Administration approval for turning old plastic bottles into new ones, and Mr Geminder said less energy was used to recycle products than making them from scratch.

Independent economic analysis commissioned by EcoRecycle Victoria found Australians saved $266 million per year by recycling, even with the energy involved in the recycling process.

Mr Geminder said there were deep markets for each recyclable commodity and VISY was actively trying to get more and more raw materials.

But while Australians are regarded as avid household recyclers, a study to be released next month is expected to show we compare badly with other countries with recycling at work and other public places.

Mr Le Messurier said there needed to be more education and legislation to stop heavy metals ending up in landfills and contaminating water and soil.

"There is no law in this state to stop you putting batteries to landfill in this point in time and there should be," he said. "There should be a process where recycling is encouraged and it means some sort of government involvement and they need to take that sooner rather than later," he said.

Mr Le Messurier said the glass tubes in television and computer monitors were 25 per cent lead and responsible for raising the lead levels in ground water near landfills but Australian governments were lagging in making laws to stop it.

"Europe has banned cathode ray tubes from landfill, a lot of the states of America are in the process of doing it or have already done so ... we have not done that."

He said his company had built plants in Sydney and Melbourne to recycle the tubes, but the government needed to face the problem and help solve it.

"In Europe the cost to landfill is something like $A300 per tonne. In Melbourne we're probably talking $35 to $50 per tonne."

He said the industry wasn't looking for handouts but a framework to discourage landfill and encourage recycling.